Page:Thoughts on civil liberty, on licentiousness and faction.djvu/83

 Purpose; because the political Connexions and Interests of Men are, above all others, complicated and various.

Hence, as no two political Constitutions were ever the same in all their Circumstances, though similar in many; so, all Arguments drawn from a partial Resemblance, must be inadequate and inconclusive; unless when it appears, that no other Circumstances took Place, by which That partial Resemblance might be counteracted, and its Effects destroyed.

Yet, it hath been a Practice too common among political Reasoners, from a partial Resemblance between two States, to infer a total one; and because they have been like in some Respects, to draw Conclusions, as if they had been like in all.

Much Caution, therefore, is necessary, in the Application of historical Facts: Without This, we shall run into perpetual Error. Let us, then, remark some of the most essential Circumstances, in which the Constitution of the British State